wherever you will go
by of self
Summary: Tawni decides she needs an escape. James decides that he'll wait around for a do-over. James/Tawni.


**wherever you will go.**

...

When Tawni wakes up on a balmy Monday morning, it strikes her that this is one of _those_ days.

One of those days where there's an inherent need to get away from everyone and everything and where the only thing you want to feel is the wind on your face and the sunlight in your eyes.

These days come once in a while and Tawni has this remedy for them.

She throws back the coverlet, marches to her bookshelf and draws out a map that she keeps for occasions like this. She spreads the map out on the nearby table, closes her eyes and lets her finger land on a random place. She opens her eyes see's where her finger has landed.

Orange County it is.

...

Tawni has never been an impulsive kind of person. She needs to think; _no_ she likes to think everything out before she does something. It's been ingrained in her since she was a little girl, look before you leap and as Tawni knows, old habits die hard. But once in a few months, or once a year, she gets this urge to throw everything up in the air and just leave, without a care for consequence. Throwing her bag into the car and stepping on the pedal as the wind streams through her hair is something like real freedom, precious and real and so _in the moment_.

Today is that day where leaves everything up to chance and leaps before she looks.

...

She draws up at the studio quick and races to her dressing room, careful to avoid everyone who knows her. As impulsive as this trip is, there's no way she's leaving without an extra tube of Coco Mocco Coco. That's something like blasphemy, going anywhere without her trusty lipstick. People think it's just a lipstick. Tawni thinks of it as a pillar. A metaphorical one albeit. It saves her when nothing else can. And a swipe of the coloured gloss on her lips makes her feel like she can climb mountains and jump off craggy cliffs unharmed. She feels invincible behind that coat of soft shimmery brown.

She snatches up the tube and a scarf and is back at the car, congratulating herself on a job well done, when she stops short at the sight of her car, dismay flooding her features. There's her car, warm and shiny and in it are Sonny Munroe, Chad Dylan Cooper and…_James_.

"Out," she snaps, pale colour flooding her face and thank god for lipstick which won't show her blanched white lips at the sight of _him_. Sonny is somewhat apologetic but she continues sitting in the car, Chad looks mutinous but he's not getting out either and James is just sitting there, smiling benignly.

"Please Tawni, you have to get me away from him. Just this once I'm begging you. Come on, you owe me." Sonny pleads with something dangerously close to tears.

"Honey, the only person I owe anything is me. And right now, me wants you three to get the heck out of my car." Sometimes, she's really surprised at how easy it is for her to ignore everything and just be herself. Maybe it's called being selfish. But then again, the people who call her selfish, they are not standing where she is, not living her life the way she does.

"For the sake of our friendship Tawni," Sonny mumbles softly and Tawni's heart maybe stumbles a bit. Yeah, that gets her and hits right on target. Their almost non-existent friendship based on insults and half baked exasperation which Tawni wouldn't give up for anything in the world.

"At tonight's rest top, all three of you will get out. And I will not fall for the friendship card again Sonny." There's no smile on her face and her voice sounds aggravated but she receives a grateful smile from Sonny in the rearview mirror and sighs heavily. This is why she doesn't like the friendship card being pulled. The whole world get's to see she's more than a blonde pretty young thing. Somehow showing the world that she has depth feels like a disastrous move. It seems better to stay pretty and petty and never let anyone know that you are a sucker for happy endings, puppy dogs which never cease wagging their tails and sunshine sprinkling over your room.

Meanwhile, Chad tries to climb over to the front seat.

"Cooper, sit the _f-ck_ down. These seats are prime leather and god knows where your feet have been."

"If Sonny is not going to talk to me, then I will stomp all over these seats. It's in your own interests to get her to talk to me Blondie. Besides, I wear Gucci Loafers. My feet only know soft leather and even softer goose down."

"Watch who you're calling Blondie, _baby_ _face_. Sonny, for the sake of our friendship, give him what he wants and stop him from spoiling my beautiful leather seats." Sonny gasps in dismay and Tawni smirks a bit. The friendship card goes two ways and damn her if she doesn't know when to pull it out either.

"You know, why don't you two kids sort it out in the backseat. I'll sit up front." James pleasantly says and Tawni almost bites her tongue to stop herself from childishly screaming _no_. She's all grown up and it was a long time ago and let bygones be bygones right?

Sonny and Chad clamber over to the back and Tawni winces for her leather seats and the assault on her ears. It's like having her screaming nephews and nieces back in there. She loves them with all her heart but dear god they make her head ache. She loves her nephews and nieces, that is. And she admits to occasionally liking Sonny. And even more occasionally to Chad being pretty. That is all. It's not like she loves them or anything. Chad and Sonny, that is.

She slips on her shades and ties the scarf around her hair and revs up the engine and pulls out of the parking lot.

Pretty soon, they are on the Interstate Highway and the bickering in the back has quieted down and her shoulders are not so tense anymore. But her hands grips the wheel tightly and not once has she looked at him. She doesn't even know why he's here and she doesn't think she has it in her to ask. He has a way of making her break down, systematically and slowly.

"Just like old times right?" James says and shoots her an enigmatic smile

And the noose around her neck of memories of old feels much, _much_ tighter.

...

Sonny and Chad are a little strange and when Tawni watches them in the rearview mirror, usually when a particularly loud insult catches her attention, she can't help but feel exasperated and also amused at them. They are that classic couple, fighting one time and fervently making up the next. They are not in a relationship as yet—cause then Sonny would have waxed eloquent to her about it, whether Tawni wanted to listen to her not— but Tawni cant help but thinking that they are two people who have already found each other, way before other people get to find their perfect half.

It doesn't matter if they are in a relationship or not because, since they already found each other and are so invested in each other, nothing _else_ matters.

And maybe, in another time, another place, another day, she would have been envious of them.

Today, she's just an observer who's happy for them.

It's not everyday you find that perfect fit, that missing puzzle to complete the jigsaw.

...

By now, the hood is drawn up, the car id devoid of any music; no pop blasting through the speakers and Tawni feels stifled. By now, on her impromptu road trips, the tension would have left her shoulders and she would be sipping a Diet Coke as she drove along.

But right now, she cant bring herself to look to her left—he never says a word and she doesn't have to look, and if it comes down to it she's supposed to be all fine, and she should be able to talk to him like nothing ever happened, but she cant.

The silence is like a thick scratchy blanket, overwhelming and too warm for comfort. And when it begins to suffocate, Tawni decides she needs to be falsely brave and grow up.

"Why are _you_ here?"

And James smiles, like all the answers to mysteries of the universe lie in the creases of his lips and the crinkles around his eyes. "Chad has my apartment keys. Something about not letting _me_ live in peace, until _he_ makes peace with Sonny."

He laughs softly and looks away and Tawni can't figure out if that's the truth or not. With him, you never know where you stand. She decides to push on because this time, she's secure in her own little island and frankly, with each second of growing up that passes by, she realizes that she has nothing to worry about.

She's happy and nothing can castle that.

...

"I didn't know you were friends with Chad."

"I'm friends with him as long as I'm not hitting on Sonny. Which in any case, I only do because he's too stubborn to see what's right in front of his eyes." There's no smile on his face, no particular faintly mocking expression, just bland sincerity etched all over it and Tawni believes it, not because she finds it easy to do so, but just because she knows that look and she's seen it in fleeting glimpses so rare, that when they do come, she has no choice but to believe it.

"Speaking of who, I'm sitting right here in the back seat." Chad grouses sulkily. It seems like he wants to lean forward to make his point but he's hampered by the fact that Sonny is fast asleep on his shoulder. And he also may be hampered by the fact that his arm is wrapped around her, hugging her close.

Tawni notices it in the mirror and on the outside she's rolling her eyes but on the inside – come on, say with her. AWWW.

"You're point being?" James is facing the window but Tawni doesn't even have to look at his face to know what's on it. She see's a faintly mocking smile, with an upward tilt of a brow. Once upon a time, that smile and that very face stole her heart. Sometimes she thinks she never really got it back in full.

She doesn't want to dwell on the fact that maybe she didn't want it back in full.

...

"Never mind." Chad snipes irritated. "But remember the ground rules James. I'm not going over them again." This cryptic add-on doesn't make sense to her. It must most probably be something regarding their over rated show and she's now enjoying the breeze wafting in from the side too much too break her head over soap-speak.

"I've grown up," James shrugs back and this apparently exasperates Chad even more.

"Growing up and changing are two different things."

And that's when James turns to look at her, smiling easily but not with his eyes which look like faint distant specks in an overcast sky.

"Of course they are," he murmurs and Tawni uneasily grips the steering wheel.

The way he looks at her, it makes her think he's subduing something that he so desperately wants to bring back up again.

She knows she should be happy that he isn't bringing it up, but some part of her feels immeasurably sad because somewhere deep inside of her, she's still that girl who feels the first flush of love intensely and smiles with stars in her eyes, full of hope.

It's the first time in five years that she allows herself to think about what could have been and how it would be now.

...

She has peace or rather an uncertain form for it for exactly 37 minutes and 51 seconds but then Sonny wakes up and she and Chad pick up like they never stopped to begin with and then Tawni loses it.

She doesn't wait for nightfall, she doesn't feel kind, she doesn't feel angry, she's just reached her limit of charitable goodness for the day.

She pulls over to the side, kills the ignition, folds her arms across her chest and waits.

Two minutes later, it finally dawns on Chad and Sonny that they have stopped.

"We reached?" Chad mutters in surprise.

"We reached?" Sonny chirps in happiness.

James laughs quietly and climbs out of the car. Tawni stares ahead like the sinking of the sun into horizon depends on her blind gaze.

"Oh, we're ditching him, are we? Good choice Blondie. He just kills the mood." Chad smirks easily at James as he mouths this. Tawni doesn't reply though. And even Chad Dylan Cooper isn't that thick that he wont take a hint.

"I think we finally snapped her," he loudly informs Sonny who hurriedly shushes him.

"Why did we stop Tawni?" Sonny asks her voice small and tiny.

"Because," Tawni sighs as she turns around. "Because, today was the day I escaped. I needed to. But I still haven't." And though she doesn't mean to cry, the tears gather at the corner of her eyes. It's not the bickering or how easily they love and care for each other that bothers her. It's the fact that even after five years, she hasn't fully moved on. That all it takes is 6 hours next to him in a car for her nerves to feel shot and her for her heart to thump haywire all over the place.

"Out." James leans his head in and beckons Chad and Sonny out. His jaw tightens in this way Tawni has only seen once or twice and maybe Chad has seen it too, only once or twice so he slides out quickly, followed by Sonny.

"Bye." Tawni whispers softly as an apology and then she drives off, sending up a cloud of dust in her wake.

"You moron, you were supposed to tell her." Sonny spits out as she spins around to face James.

"Yeah genius, this was all your grand plan. We played along and then finally, when it comes down to it, you bail!" Chad is irritated because if there is anything he dislikes, it's a script gone wrong.

"I was scared for her," James states quietly before walking forward and sticking his hand out for a lift.

Chad's mouth quietly forms an o and Sonny unhappily follows in James wake.

...

This time, they don't see Tawni around for a week.

Every morning James come to the So Random set and he hangs around aimless and people walk past him with pitying smiles which he doesn't even see.

Every day he goes back, thinking – she ran away for good this time. And that maybe he shouldn't go to the studio and wait for her the next day, because she doesn't owe him anything at all. No apology and definitely no explanation.

But then he thinks – just one more day. Just one more day, he'll go and wait and see if she will come.

And then he'll tell her all.

...

Two months pass by and he still doesn't give up on waiting.

And then Tawni arrives.

She doesn't look different and she still has that breezy sarcastic attitude that she always did. The only thing different here and it's no surprise to him, is that she's avoiding him.

So he confronts her because two months of waiting around and wavering is finally getting to him.

"You're avoiding me," he lets her know flatly as he catches her racing between the dressing room and the set, rubbing off make-up on the way to save time. Or avoid him. He thinks it's the latter.

"Of course I am," she snaps. "What else can I do? I leave, you are there. I come back, you are _still_ here. I'm running out of places to hide. "

"I don't mean to freak you out. I guess, I guess I just want a do-over." And the moments the words are out of his mouth, he knows they are selfish.

But Tawni isn't angry. Just weary.

"Five years ago, you left. You drilled a hole in my heart and left. You came back once or twice and even then, you hit on my –"she can't bring herself to call Sonny best friend. God, she isn't _that_ lame. She's a friend though. Just not one whom she'd like to give a tag to.

"Even then, you hit on Sonny. And now, you come back and say you want a do over. Tell me James, if you were me, would you even listen to yourself?" This Tawni who is saying all of these words, she's not the Tawni who he knew. But this grown-up Tawni, the one who is obviously doing better without him, this new Tawni with the patient, weary, aching voice, and her quiet words knock a whole lot of sense into his head and slam him with the force of speeding trucks.

He wants to say something but she's still got some more to get off her chest.

"All these years, I thought I got over you. But then I saw you that day and I realized, I never did. And most importantly, I never would. I guess I loved you too much. And I don't want to do that to myself ever again." Her voice cracks once or twice but Tawni says it all. Rather, she has to say it. She has to let him know how it felt. At least a semblance of what it's like to have your heart crack in an ungainly manner.

James has nothing to say. No words can fix the mess he left and nothing will mend what she feels now.

"You need a friend, I'll be around. And maybe as your friend, I'll follow you to the ends of the earth. But nothing more, nothing less." And with this swift smile, a smile full of promise, Tawni leaves.

James smiles.

A friend who will accompany him to the ends of the earth.

Yeah, he could do with one.

...

a/n – The idea was to do a nice introspective Tawni piece. As you may or may not know, sometimes my ideas tend to go horribly haywire. And the ending? Call it a lost cause. :)


End file.
